


Stone in a Haystack

by wynnebat



Series: Hope is the thing with phoenix feathers [2]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: AU of an AU, Angst and Humor, Crack, Female Harry Potter, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Obliviousness, Rule 63, Sane Voldemort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-23
Updated: 2018-02-23
Packaged: 2019-03-23 02:27:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,099
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13777728
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wynnebat/pseuds/wynnebat
Summary: The scene where Holly and Quirrellmort find Hagrid goes a little differently.





	Stone in a Haystack

**Author's Note:**

> From [chapter one](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13435224/chapters/30791520): 
> 
>  
> 
> _Too soon, Holly’s delicious ice cream cone was gone. Instead of directing them toward the Leaky Cauldron, Quirrell led her toward a different pub, one closer to a street called Knockturn Alley, though not quite inside the alley. He motioned her through and with a bit of suspicion Holly entered. The reason they were there became obvious quickly. Hagrid, her first guide to the wizarding world, was passed out in one of the corner tables._
> 
>  
> 
> _“Oh, Hagrid,” Holly murmured._
> 
>  
> 
> _Quirrell tapped his wand against Hagrid’s shoulder and said a word she didn’t catch. Instantly, Hagrid jumped up with wild eyes._
> 
>  
> 
> _“Wha— ‘olly! What ‘appened?” He looked around and Holly saw recognition dawn in his eyes. “I only meant ta ‘ave a pint…” Hagrid sounded horrified. He smelled terrible, sounded worse, his words stumbling together as he apologized to her._
> 
>  
> 
> _“It’s okay, Hagrid,” Holly said before he could berate himself more._
> 
>  
> 
> _“Really?”_
> 
>  
> 
> _“I promise,” Holly said, even though she really didn’t quite mean her words._

“I’ve gotta pay m’ tab,” Hagrid sniffles, standing up shakily. He knocks down his beer mug in the process and it topples to the ground with the sound of glass breaking. “Oh, no…”

Holly’s already tense, eyes shut in case of flying glass shards and just waiting for Aunt Petunia’s shrill voice. The scolding she expects doesn’t come; of course it doesn’t come, she’s not at home. Holly opens one eye, then another, and her worst nightmare is once again realized: she’s holding Hagrid’s mug in her hands without having reached down to pick it up. It’s completely unbroken and the glass is chilly under her hands. Holly looks up to see Quirrell staring right at her.

“It just happens sometimes,” Holly says, miserably. She knows she’s not supposed to—she’s supposed to use the beautiful wand in her pocket, and only at school—but she couldn’t help it. “I didn’t mean to.”

“I-it is only a-accidental m-magic,” Quirrell replies, taking the mug from her hands and turning it over. “M-magical children often d-do similar things.”

“But I wasn’t supposed to,” Holly says. Aunt Petunia would’ve— But Aunt Petunia isn’t here, and no one here is going to tell on her, and no one here is going to call her a freak or scream in surprise.

“M-miss Potter, you are a witch. Act like one.” Quirrell sets the mug down onto the table with a stern look in her direction. “M-magic is a natural thing and your actions were perfectly warranted.”

“Not freakish?” Holly mumbles, not meeting his eyes. Beside them, Hagrid has started emptying his pockets in search of coins to pay for his drink—or _drinks_ , lots of them, with how out of it he seems. It’s like with the goblins at the counter at Gringotts all over again, except this time Holly just wants to be out of here. She wants to go back to the ice cream shop, or maybe the pet store, or even creepy Mr. Ollivander’s. This time, the doormice scatter when Hagrid dumps them onto the table.

Quirrell gives her a somewhat uncomfortable look, although as a teacher he must be used to students coming up to him with their questions. “No. Not freakish.”

“It still doesn’t feel real, that I have magic, that I’m going to Hogwarts.” When Holly looks at him again, Quirrell is watching her with an inscrutable expression. “But I do have enough magic, don’t I?”

“You have entirely too much magic,” Quirrell sighs. At Holly’s hopeful look, he continues with, “You’ll arrive at Hogwarts on the Hogwarts Express, which will be bustling with irritating students and whichever professor got the short end that year, and be sorted into one of the four houses by a demented old hat. Into Gryffindor, no doubt, where you’ll instantly lose any wits you may have had.”

“I will _not_ ,” Holly retorts.

“Prior experience has me doubtful.”

“But what happens next?”

“You attend your core classes with the occasional day in which you try to get yourself killed, as all proper Gryffindors seem to do,” Quirrell replies, dryly. But it’s comforting beyond all reason, this vision of the future that Quirrell paints, where Holly can be a witch instead of a freak or the Girl Who Lived. “You’ll get average marks one year, then the next, then the next, and so on until the boats that carried you in as a first year carry you out during graduation. And then…” he trails off. “Then you do something with your life.”

“I’m going to do something cool—like tame dragons!” Holly’s not actually sure how one tames dragons, but she wants to do it. She wants to do everything except what she knows she’ll do soon: walk through the front door of number four, Privet Drive. “I’ll be tall, and I’ll have a job, and I’ll never have to see the Dursleys again.”

“It’s always good to have dreams,” Quirrell tells her. “Although if I remember correctly, neither of your parents were particularly tall, and you seem to be following in their footsteps.”

“ _Professor_ ,” Holly squawks. She takes everything back; Quirrell isn’t comforting at all. But then there’s a sound of, “Aha!” from next to her, distracting her from Quirrell’s words.

“Found it,” Hagrid exclaims, holding up a draw-string pouch. He goes off to track down the bartender, swaying as he walks.

There’s a whole mountain of stuff on the table he’d been collapsed against only minutes before: parchment, at least six quills, one last confused-looking doormouse, more sausage links, a set of scales, biscuits the size of Holly’s fists… and the mysterious wrapped package that she and Hagrid had picked up from Gringotts. The one for important Dumbledore business, which Hagrid seems to be treating with as much importance as Holly’s Diagon Alley trip by leaving it right here. Holly glances at Quirrell, who’s looking in Hagrid’s direction with a sneer, and chances a peak at the mysterious package. She opens one side of the paper wrapping without ripping the paper or breaking the twine. She just wants to see what it is, not cause trouble for Hagrid with Dumbledore. What she sees inside doesn’t satisfy her curiosity: the small object seems to be just a stone. A pretty, blood-red stone, but still a stone.

“Put that down,” Quirrell says, his voice sharp but quiet.

Holly does so instantly. “I’m sorry! I was just curious.”

Quirrell places a hand on the package, his fingers wrapping around the opening until she can’t see a bit of the deep red. “This doesn’t belong to you. Not that Hagrid has any more business having it.”

“It’s for Dumbledore,” Holly says guiltily. “Hagrid was retrieving it.”

“Like he retrieved you,” Quirrell says with dark amusement.

Even though that’s what Holly was thinking just moments ago, she hates the way it sounds. Still, “It all worked out in the end, didn’t it? You found me and helped me with my school list. You even let me buy a _pet._ ”

“Truly, what kindness,” Quirrell replies, though his voice seems far away. “It’s time for us to be off, Miss Potter.”

Quirrell ushers her out of the bar without even waiting for Hagrid to return, although Holly doesn’t mind. Hagrid had been nice at first, and then… Well, Quirrell had been nicer, that’s all. Holly chances a glance behind herself while Quirrell is distracted, her eyes falling to the empty space where the stone had been. It seems that Quirrell is fulfilling the other task that Hagrid has half-done for Dumbledore. Really, Professor Quirrell is terribly responsible, she decides.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!
> 
> I'm also on tumblr as @[crownwithoutstones](https://crownwithoutstones.tumblr.com/).


End file.
